This whole story stinks. Scotland politically has insisted on maintaining its own supply chains for PPE, with Scotland's Health Secretary Jeane Freeman making this clear in her letter to the UK Health Secretary. From BBC article; "remind him that he specifically does not have my agreement to the centralisation of ordering or distribution of PPE".

However after asking my friends when I read this story at lunch, (doctors and nurses I know working in Oban, Glasgow and Aberdeen (as well as a couple in Portsmouth, England)) they told me the NHSs supply chain has been part-centralised to allow for extra bulk orders and that there has been no prioritisation of PPE one way or the other. The trusts have been told to order them from their normal suppliers and if you require extra (which they all do right now) that your normal supplier cannot fulfil (which they all can't right now) to contact the NSDR.

What seems to be the issue is that companies that normally supply NHS England have therefore been asked not to supply extras to other trusts/take extra orders. These companies that are supplying 'only' NHS England trust with the PPE are doing so because that is their normal supply chain and therefore should not be interrupted by taking in extra orders outside of that. Extra orders will be made by the NSDR and then supplied to NHS Scotland.

These companies 'refusing' to supply NHS Scotland are actually supplying NHS Scotland through the NSDR order scheme.

So is there any truth in this England prioritisation? NO - as stated by Scotlands Clinical Chief.

Are there companies not supplying NHS Scotland? YES, but not for the reason of location, trying to circumvent the NSDR scheme is more likely.

Hence this is a political stir story, stinks and is distracting from the real issue or tackling COVID and keeping our medical staff alive.